The Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals in California ruled in favor of E. Pierce Marshall, the son of Texas oil tycoon Howard Marshall, whom the late Playboy centerfold married in 1994 after meeting him while working at a strip club. She was 26 at the time and he was 89."

Cops: Burglar Logs Into MySpace on Store Computer - ABC News: "A burglar who spent about five hours on a store's computer after breaking into the business gave police all the clues they needed to track him down. Investigators said the 17-year-old logged into his MySpace account while at Bella Office Furniture and that made it easy for them to find him. He also spent time looking at pornography and trying to sell stolen items, all while using the business' computer."

Since it is capable of cycling from a mature adult stage to an immature polyp stage and back again, there may be no natural limit to its life span. Scientists say the hydrozoan jellyfish is the only known animal that can repeatedly turn back the hands of time and revert to its polyp state (its first stage of life)."

Police with Austin’s High Tech Crime Unit on Wednesday arrested 20-year-old Omar Ramos-Lopez, a former Texas Auto Center employee who was laid off last month, and allegedly sought revenge by bricking the cars sold from the dealership’s four Austin-area lots."

Well, you guessed it. This is another free download from Munsey's. I can't seem to resist those things, even though I already own the books. This was my St. Patrick's Day book, and let me quote the fifth paragraph:

His name really was Sweeney, but he was only five-eighths Irish and he was only three-quarters drunk. But that's about as near as truth ever approximates a pattern, and if you won't settle for that, you'd better quit reading. If you don't, maybe you'll be sorry, for it isn't a nice story. It's got murder in it, and woman and liquor and gambling and even prevarication. There's murder before the story proper starts, and murder after it ends; the actual story begins with a naked woman and ends with one, which is a good opening and a good ending, but everything between isn't nice. Don't say I didn't warn you. But if you're still with me, let's get back to Sweeney.So how long has it been since you read a novel who's omniscient narrator addressed the reader directly like that? A long time, I'm sure, and Brown doesn't do it just at the beginning. He breaks into the narrative every now and then like that. And you know what? It works just fine.

Sweeney is a reporter who's been on a long bender, but when he sees a naked woman whose stomach's been slashed, he sobers up almost instantly. He manages to write a story about her, and then he begins his own investigation of the ripper killer who's on the loose in Chicago. If you read the excerpt above, you know pretty much what the book has in it, and how can you resist wanting to read it? The book must have been shocking and surprising in its time (1949), but today's readers won't find it so. Doesn't matter. It's still a great read.

And then there's the totally loopy movie version with Anita Ekberg (!), which is not to be missed. Supposedly the famous film Bird with the Crystal Plumage was also based on this book, though Brown's not credited.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Researchers create 3-D invisibility cloak: study: "European researchers have taken the world a step closer to fictional wizard Harry Potter's invisibility cape after they made an object disappear using a three-dimensional 'cloak,' a study published Thursday in the US-based journal Science showed.

Scientists from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany and Imperial College London used the cloak, made using photonic crystals with a structure resembling piles of wood, to conceal a small bump on a gold surface, they wrote in Science.

'It's kind of like hiding a small object underneath a carpet -- except this time the carpet also disappears,' they said."

Los Angeles County sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said 39-year-old Landry Boullard was arrested Wednesday after detectives received an anonymous tip. He was booked on suspicion of attempted murder."

Family spokeswoman Sao Anash said Parker, who was also TV's Daniel Boone and later a major California winemaker and developer, died at his Santa Ynez Valley home. His death comes on the 84th birthday of his wife of 50 years, Marcella."

Pride's smooth baritone voice was featured on thirty-six number-one hits on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts. His greatest success came in the early-to-mid 1970s, when he was the best-selling performer for RCA Records since Elvis Presley.[1] His chart success and recordings since the late 1980s have been sporadic, but Pride continued touring successfully."

We're warned at the beginning that (500) Days of Summer isn't a love story, but it is. It just doesn't play by the rules of a standard love story. In fact, it doesn't play by any rules except its own, and that's what makes it so much fun.

It's the story of a relationship between a girl named Summer (Zooey Deschanel) and Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). The relationship lasts 500 days, but the story's not told in chronological order. It skips around, but the numbers are flashed on the screen in parentheses (as in the title) so you know where you are. I'd describe what goes on and how different it all is, but it's really the kind of thing you should find out for yourself. (I seem to say that a lot in my reviews, but it's always true. Trust me.) It provides everything from quiet smiles to belly laughs, and there are a couple of exhilarating scenes that took my completely by surprise.

The performances are perfect. Deschanel is just mysterious enough as a young woman who always keeps a little bit of herself hidden, and Gordon-Levitt is just as good at playing a young man whose feelings are often all too obvious. His sidekicks are great, too. And Chole Moretz steals all her scenes, in preparation, no doubt for her upcoming role in Kick Ass, which is a slightly different kind of movie.

You probably have to be in the right mood to enjoy a movie like (500) Days of Summer. If you're looking for Rambo 6, you're in the wrong place. Even if you're looking for, say, You've Got Mail, you're in the wrong place. Think more along the lines of Annie Hall. And then check it out.

Chilton died at a hospital in New Orleans after experiencing what appeared to be heart problems, said his longtime friend John Fry. Fry said Chilton's wife, Laura, was very distressed by the unexpected death.

'Alex was an amazingly talented person, not just as a musician and vocalist and a songwriter, but he was intelligent and well read and interested in a wide number of music genres,' said Fry, the owner of Memphis-based Ardent Studios.

As the teenage singer for the pop-soul outfit the Box Tops, Chilton topped the charts with the band's song 'The Letter' in 1967. Their other hits were 'Soul Deep' and 'Cry Like a Baby.' Chilton grew up in Memphis, Tenn., and formed the band with friends from school."

‘77 Sunset Strip’ On Its Way At Warner Bros – Deadline.com: "Warner Bros is dusting off its classic TV series 77 Sunset Strip, and turning it into a hip period feature. The film will be directed by Greg Berlanti, the Green Lantern writer who is previewing part of his new film, Life As We Know It, at ShoWest. Stephen Chin is in talks to write the script. Berlanti will produce with author A. Scott Berg and Kevin McCormick, through the latter’s Warner-based Langley Park shingle."

College Students Who Stay Too Long - ABC News: "Last month, members of the Second Task Force on Enrollment Strategy [at The University of Texas at Austin] recommended the school's administration adopt a 10-semester limit on how long students can stay to pursue their degree in Austin. This academic restriction would probably be the first of its kind, said Steven Leslie, UT executive vice president and provost, who appointed the task force.

'The intent is not to get out any student,' said Isabella Cunningham, the task force's chairwoman. '[It's] to provide the right kind of environment to have a successful career at the University of Texas.'"

The day-after event on Thursday will give free drink coupons to people who donate a pint of blood. The coupons are redeemable for a drink at Rookies' Pub in St. Charles. Other St. Patrick's themed giveaways and events are on tap for donors as well."

If I were making a short list of the best crime writers around, which I'm not, I'd certainly include Don Winslow. The reason I'm not making the list is that I don't read widely enough to feel qualified, but if I did, I'll bet I'd still include Winslow. If you need any proof that he belongs on the list, read The Gentleman's Hour. Or for that matter, read just about anything else he's written.

The Gentleman's Hour is a sequel to The Dawn Patrol, and it again features Boone Daniels and his friends who go out early every morning to surf. They're the Dawn Patrol. One day Boone hangs around into the Gentleman's Hour when some of the older surfers come along. Most of them are successful businessmen, including Dan Nichols, who has a problem. His wife, he says, is unfaithful, and he wants Boone to find out for sure. Boone works as a private-eye, but he hates matrimonials. Nichols pleads, and Boone accepts, to his sorrow.

Then Petra Hall wants to hire Boone to help with the legal defense of Corey Blassingame, a young man who's confessed to killing Kelly Kuhio, a beloved surfer and local legend. Everyone, including Boone's closet friends, wants Blassingame in prison for life of, better yet, dead. But Boone accepts the job, again to his sorrow. The fact that he'd work on the kid's defense causes considerable tension between him and his friends.

Throw in feuding drug lords, real estate scams, and a villain who loves to torture people, and things get pretty complex. As dark as the subject matter is, Winslow somehow manages to keep the sun shining. Fine writing, great characters, and superb plotting do the job. You can't ask for much more than that. Check it out.

Top 10 St. Patrick's Day TV Episodes: "'Going green' should conjure up visions of St. Patrick's Day -- a day for Guinness, parades, and little men in green suits. In honor of this annual bash, TV Tango kissed the Blarney Stone and found the 10 best St. Patrick's Day episodes in TV history."

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Jerry Lewis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: "Jerry Lewis (born March 16, 1926) is an American comedian, actor, film producer, writer, film director and singer. He is best-known for his slapstick humor in stage, screen, television, radio, and recording and is also known for his charity fund-raising telethons and position as national chairman for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA). Lewis has won several awards for lifetime achievements from The American Comedy Awards, The Golden Camera, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and The Venice Film Festival, and he has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 2005, he received the Governors Award of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Board of Governors, which is the highest Emmy Award presented."

But investigators quickly learned the man actually had shot himself, and documents released Monday revealed the man had tried -- and failed -- to booby trap his car."[. . . .]"'When he returned to his vehicle after jogging in the park he attempted to disarm his booby trap, accidentally set off the gun and shot himself in the leg.'"

League City Police Lt. Bruce Whitten said the theft happened just after 3 p.m. Sunday at the Starbucks at 100 E. Main Street.

A white man in his early 20s pulled into drive-through line in a 2000 Chrysler PT Cruiser, ordered a drink, drove up to the window and then stole the tip jar when the employee turned to get his order, Whitten said."

I'm a sucker for movies about magicians, er, excuse me, mentalists, so The Great Buck Howard was something I figured I'd like. And I did.

John Malkovich plays the title character, who's based on The Amazing Kreskin, and Colin Hanks plays his road manager. Howard plays a lot of medium-sized cities (they love him in Akron), though he'd once been a bigger star, being almost a regular on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and playing the big casinos in Las Vegas. He might have gone down the ladder of success, but he's still enthusiastic about his job, and he still has the personality quirks of a primouomo. Hanks begins working for him after he drops out of law school.

So what we have is a coming-of-age movie and one about a former star who's coping with his lesser fame. Both stories worked just fine for me, and there are some very funny moments. Malkovich is just about perfect as Howard, but Hanks is no slouch. Neither is Emily Blunt, and Steve Zahn has a nice role as a guy who really, really admires Buck.

At one point in the movie, when Buck has a big feat prepared, one that he believes will get him back on top, disaster strikes. Or does it? What seems to be a disaster could be the thing that might take him right back to the top. I won't tell you how that works out.

Buck's big closing trick at every show is to have someone in the audience hide his fee. If he doesn't find it, he doesn't get it, but he always finds it. Hanks doesn't know how he does it, and he never asks. The trick is important to the plot in ways that you'd best discover for yourself.

The Great Buck Howard must not have made much noise at the box office, but it's a dandy little film to watch at home. Check it out.

| The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor: "It's the birthday of the children's writer who said, 'I sometimes think I was born to set a bad example.' That's Sid Fleischman, (books by this author) born in Brooklyn (1920). His family moved to San Diego when he was a toddler, and when he was in fifth grade he decided to become a magician. After high school, he toured with vaudeville, worked as a journalist, fought in WWII. When he was 19, he published a book about magic tricks, Between Cocktails (1939). He made a living writing mysteries and adventure novels, and John Wayne's movie company bought the film rights to his novel Blood Alley and asked Fleischman to write the screenplay. It was made into a movie starring Wayne and Lauren Bacall in 1955."

Hot Air � Blog Archive � The good news that went unreported on air quality: "Last week, the EPA released its annual report on air quality trends … and no one noticed. Why? Unlike most environmental reports, this one didn’t contain dire warnings about the threat of disaster. In fact, as the Institute for Energy Research notes, the EPA discovered that our air has gotten progressively cleaner over the last four decades, and significantly so over the last twenty."

Evan Lewis has some nice photos from his recent visit to the Alamo, so I thought I'd post one of my first visit there. This must have been around 1946 or '47. I'm on the left, my sister's on the right, and my brother's in the middle.

Okay, dudes. Today is Pi Day (March 14 = 3/14 = 3.14... = pi), and we all know what that means. You now have no choice but to click on the link below and enjoy the wondrous slide show I've created in celebration of Pi Day. Of course, you can choose not to click on the link, but if you do, I won't be responsible for the terrible things that happen to you because you decided not to celebrate Pi Day. I won't be responsible!

Actionfest, billed as the first festival devoted to nothing but action films, happens April 15-18 at the Carolina Asheville cinema. Norris, star of the long-running TV series “Walker, Texas Ranger” and many action films, will be given the first Lifetime Action Achievement Award.

Actionfest also includes such world premieres as “Centurion,” a warring Roman epic starring Michael Fassbender of “Inglourious Basterds'' fame. And there's a demonstration of a rocket belt flying device by veteran stuntman Kinnie Gibson. The festival was created by Aaron Norris (brother of Chuck Norris) and Bill Banowsky, owner of the Carolina Asheville cinemas."